The Tbilisi City Court has fined Giorgi Gedenidze 2,000 lari for insulting Nika Gvaramia, one of the leaders of the Coalition for Change, on social media.
Georgia’s Ministry of Internal Affairs stated that on June 3, Gedenidze left an insulting comment directed at the politician under a Facebook post by the pro-government Imedi TV. This violation was identified by the Hate Speech Department of the country’s Ministry of Internal Affairs.
The case was heard under Article 166 of the Code of Administrative Offenses of Georgia. Neither Gedenidze himself nor his lawyer attended the court hearing.
Nika Gvaramia later commented on the news, stating that he learned about the court’s decision from the media and knows neither Gedenidze himself nor what he wrote on social media.
The opposition politician also sharply criticized the actions of the Georgian authorities, calling the situation unprecedented. He said he found it strange that the state had initiated the case on its own over an online comment without contacting him as the alleged victim.
“If I do not consider myself insulted, is the state protecting my dignity without taking my position into account?
And this is being done by the very same government that blackmailed me, sent me behind bars four times, put me under surveillance, plastered my photos all over Tbilisi before every election, secretly filmed my wife and child, and then sent those recordings to me.
And it still counts… Such madness is impossible to imagine,” Gvaramia wrote on social media.